Literacy with an Attitude

This book is for teachers, parents, and community organizers who are on the side of working-class children. It's about the resistance of working class children to the kind of education they typically receive, education designed to make them useful workers and obedient citizens. It's about working-class habits of communication and ways of using language that interfere with schooling. It's about a new brand of teachers, followers of Brazilian educator Paulo Freire who are developing effective methods for teaching powerful literacy in American working-class classrooms. It's about teacher networks where teachers devoted to equity and justice find mutual support. And it's about community organizers who are bringing working-class parents together around education issues and helping them mount effective demands for powerful literacy for their children.

About Patrick Finn

Patrick J. Finn is Associate Professor Emeritus of Education at the University at Buffalo, State University of New York. Finn was named the Robert F. and Augusta Finkelstein Memorial Lecturer for Fall 2008 at Adelphi University.

Teacher Education with an Attitude

He is the coeditor (with Mary E. Finn) of Teacher Education with an Attitude: Preparing Teachers to Educate Working-Class Students in Their Collective Self-Interest, also published by SUNY Press.

Urban Education with and Attitude

Also in the "Attitude" series is Urban Education with an Attitude, edited by Mary E. Finn with Lauri Johnson and Rebecca Lewis.